To say it has been a tough year for the computer industry would be an understatement. AMD has been particularly hard hit, despite being the second largest chipmaker around.

In October, AMD announced that it would be spinning off its chip making facilities into a different company with AMD holding 44.4% of the new chip making company. The spin off resulted in a suit brought against AMD by rival chipmaker Intel over alleged license violations caused by the spinoff of AMD's processor making arm.

AMD announced this week that in an effort to reduce its manufacturing costs and adjust to the current state of the economy it would own even less than the previously noted 44.4% of the chip making spinoff. The majority owner of the spun off chip making division was the Abu Dhabi-based Advanced Technology Investment Company (ATIC) and a minority owner was Mubadala Development.

Amendments between AMD and ATIC will have AMD owning 34.2% of the chip making arm and ATIC grabbing 65.8% of the Foundry. An AMD representative said the sale was due to "changing economic times." AMD is fighting for its survival in the face of falling profits and increased competition. AMD announced this week that it was cutting revenue projections by 25% for Q4 2008.

Other amendments between the owners of the Foundry include a restructured agreement that allows Mubadala to purchase 58 million shares of AMD common stock at a revised purchase price equal to the lower of average closing price per share on the NYSE during the 20 trading days prior to and including December 12, 2008; or the average closing price per share of AMD common stock on the NYSE during the 20 trading days prior to the transaction close date.

AMD released a statement saying, "All other material economic terms of the transaction agreements remain unchanged. ATIC will still invest $2.1 billion to purchase its stake in the Foundry Company, of which it will invest $1.4 billion directly in the new entity and will pay $700 million to AMD."

Comments

Threshold

Username

Password

remember me

This article is over a month old, voting and posting comments is disabled

I'm all for everything that keeps AMD in business. Their roadmap looks promising, and if they can continue to keep a competitive pricing (and no setbacks like experienced with the first Phenoms) they still have a big role in the market.

Actually I think AMD has been doing right in maybe not going for THE fastest CPU's out there, but instead keep a pricing that stays competitive.